GlitchHunting
by AbsoluteObscurity
Summary: “I wasn’t aware that Nobodies had birthdays in the first place.” Larxene actually manages to do something on the borderline of nice- LarxNami, fluff-ish, pre-COM, rated T for slight amounts of swearing, one-shot.


OKAY, so, first fic in a while- I'm trying to snap out of this damned writer's block and this idea wouldn't go away, so I finally wrote it. No smut in here, unfortunately, but I think it turned out nicely, slight oocness aside. ALSO, to those of you who only have me on your alert list because of Scheme, it'll be up in about a week or two, whenever my beta decides to finish going through it and whenever I get an idea for the last chapter, so sit tight?

---

"It's my birthday today."

Larxene looked up from her spot by the window with a mild degree of interest, idle hands adjusting her gloves and straightening out her clothes. The sun was only just rising, the rays slowly spilling out across the surrounding countryside and lighting up the bedroom's floor with hints of pale gold and light red, the colors strangely callous against the marble surface. As XII had been told at the last meeting between Axel's snarky comments and Lexaeus' occasionally thoughtful interjections, the keyblade bearer was due to arrive within the next week or so according to the pace that he had been travelling at thus far and Marluxia had decided to make sure that everything was in perfect order beforehand. Of course, as **XI** daren't dirty his hands with the minute and disgustingly tedious details, the Organization members stationed at Castle Oblivion were left to do it for him, to check and recheck that not a strand of fabricated grass was out of place, that each floor was pristine and bristling with meaningless, fictional life, that everything would react the way that they expected, the way that would best suit the Organization. After all, their miniature, fake worlds had to be spitting images of their originals and if any 'glitches' were found, they were to waste no time in reporting it to one of their superiors. At the moment, the Savage Nymph was set to go on her day-shift that happened to start in exactly four minutes and thirty-three seconds, but as she usually did before she carried out a direct order, she had gone to squander her final free moments of the day in a certain white witch's room.

"I wasn't aware that Nobodies had birthdays in the first place."

Naminé, who was sitting cross-legged on her bed and watching the blonde idly pull at the silver drawstrings on her uniform, nodded before giving a sage smile and raking her fingers through her sleep-mussed hair.

"Well, I remember my Somebody's birthday and it's today, so I suppose that this is my birthday too. Don't you remember your Somebody's birthday?"

The blonde barely kept herself from correcting the platinum-blonde girl (after all, a Nobody was not born on their Somebody's birthday, so their real 'birthday' would have to be whenever their Somebody lost their heart. Of course, it was a given that in the eyes of most of the Organization members, the day that they lost the only thing that they have the capacity to want happens to be far from something worth celebrating), but she only just managed to hold her tongue, the sharp words already fighting to escape. After all, Naminé's memories, no matter how ridiculous the blonde thought they were, were obviously of significance to her and if she said it was her Somebody's birthday, it must be her birthday too. Logically, if **II** let Demyx believe what he wanted to, then the Nymph found no reason to stifle this whimsical thought as well. At least, not until it best suited XII.

"No, I don't."

The clock over Naminé's desk struck seven and, after nodding over in the witch's direction, Larxene opened a portal and left for the first floor, leaving a slightly disappointed Naminé behind on the 13th.

---

"Do you ever have those times when someone says something so utterly dense to you that you can't even think of anything to say back to them?"

Axel paused, his hand planted firmly on the fountain in the center of their fake Traverse Town, thin shoulders rising in a half-assed shrug before he went back to checking the cobblestones for anything that might or might not be amiss.

"Demyx has had his moments; if you're gonna get technical about it."

Larxene, who was busy inspecting a bench, didn't even feel obligated to roll her eyes.

"Naminé has decided that today is her birthday, apparently- she even asked _me_ when I thought _my_ birthday was. You don't get this kind of shit from Roxas, do you? How perfectly infantile."

Axel moved to lean over the fountain and, for a moment, Larxene couldn't figure out if he was looking for glitches or being vain. She could hear the water hissing softly from across the room, as if they had randomly unearthed a nest of vipers within the castle.

"Well, what'd you get 'er?"

Teal eyes flicked up from the middle slat of the bench that she'd been idly checking over to stare at Axel's back in near-disbelief. Was he really that stupid?

"Get her?"

"Yeah- I dunno what world _your_ Somebody came from, but back in mine, it's customary to give gifts on someone's birthday. Y'know, to show you care that they exist."

Larxene paused, her eyebrows narrowing slightly as she pursed her lips in thought. "Nothing." She wasn't ashamed or abashed to admit it, but Axel was gradually starting to get on the Nymph's nerves with that stupid tone of voice that he was using, as if _he_ knew more than _she_ did.

"Well then, get her something."

And, with that, Axel pulled himself back up from his position by the fountain, sharp green eyes clashing with aggravated teal before he announced that surely Larxene could finish up her rounds without help. Before Larxene could summon up any biting words as a last-moment retort, he had left, his footsteps echoing as he opened a portal and left her to check over the 1st floor on her own, silently fuming and pretending that she hadn't taken any of his ideas into consideration after all.

---

It was twenty-four past nine and Naminé was lightly dozing, curled around her pillow with her sheets draped over her incredibly pale legs and hips. On a normal day, she would've been hard at work by now, scribbling out every last detail of some obscure world, adding endless shades of colors and vibrancy to the usually blank floors below, but she had finished reconstructing every single person, plant, animal and setting two weeks ago and, since then, she had yet to get any orders from anyone else. 

Unfortunately, this quickly led to her to a nauseating amount of boredom and it wasn't long until she took to sleeping when she wasn't even tired and drawing things that she would just end up destroying an hour later anyway (unauthorized creation would probably bring her back to Marluxia's attention and she didn't exactly want _that_, even if she hated being bored).

Naminé had always been a light sleeper. Ever since she had been born as a Nobody, she had found that even though she didn't have a power that could properly defend herself like the other Nobodies had (unless she wanted to try to beat Axel or Vexen over the head with her tubes of paint until they went unconscious), she never wanted anybody to enter her room without her explicit awareness of it. She hated letting other people catch her when she was asleep, so she had trained herself to wake up at the slightest noises- footsteps, portals, doors, her window- it didn't matter, as long as she was awake to 'greet' them.

So, when a small, hand-sized portal opened with a low fwoosh, followed by the soft clink of china against synthetic white wood, she stirred slightly, her calm cobalt eyes slowly batting open to look around for the source. Was it Axel with a request? Was Marluxia coming down to ask something of her? Had Larxene already finished her rounds?

Unfortunately, even after inspecting everything in her room, looking for those familiar black robes that strikingly contrasted with everything else that she kept in her chambers, she found that nobody was there after all, even though she was sure that she had heard _something_. Instead, the only real addition to her room happened to be sitting there on her starch-white bedside table. It was a mug, the contents still steaming up and forming little droplets on the spoon that was lying neatly across the top of the cup. That was… curious. She was usually never sent food- if she wanted something to eat or drink, she normally had to go get it herself from the kitchen down the hall. Even when she was ill, she had to get her own food, if she felt up to actually eating or drinking anything. But then again, after taking a slightly suspicious sniff of what she could only assume to be tea, she threw all caution to the wind, scooped it up into her hands and took a small sip, smiling a little to herself when she recognized the flavor as cinnamon and orange.

At ten forty-two, Naminé was busy reorganizing her art supplies by color and stock- that is, until a small silver tiger's head dropped down from a portal onto her duvet cover, scattering the colored pencils that she had already lined up in a painstakingly neat row.

By twelve sixteen, a little urn labeled as 'deadly nightshade' interrupted her rather uneventful day-dreaming. Inside were seventeen shriveled black flowers and, without even thinking about it, she moved to place them on one of her empty bookshelves- right next to where she had placed the now-empty cup and the tiger's head.

The next portal opened at about two o'clock, but this one was different. This time, instead of the usual trinket, a tiny stuffed pig dropped down, squealing and shuddering onto her pillowcase and, in no time at all, it was cowering underneath her sheets, quaking and whimpering to itself. Even though Naminé tried to calm what she recognized as one of her false-characters down by offering it a few biscuits and soft words, the little animal was too terrified to even peek out of its hiding place. After figuring that all of her efforts to placate the pig were in vain and that if she heard another "Oh d-d-dear!" she would go insane, Naminé hardly hesitated to open a portal to the 7th floor, ushering the creature through it before it even had the chance to object in that trembling little voice of his. However, even after she was alone in her room again, the faint scent of honeysuckle insistently drifted around the room, lightening her mood after her odd little visitor. Shortly afterwards when she was straightening out her sheets and brushing down her duvet, she found a rose-colored conch shell resting at the foot of her bed.

Two hours passed by the time that a palm-sized, bronze pocketwatch bounced down from above and landed on the witch's desk, interrupting her aimless sketching and making her jerk a little in surprise. After fiddling around with it and finally figuring out how to properly open it without forcing her short fingernails underneath the metal cover, she was glad to find that it wasn't broken after all and that it showed the exact same time as her own clock, to the very second.

It was five thirty-six when the next portal formed next to Naminé's window and, this time, it was big enough for a person to enter through. Larxene, who looked understandably worn out after her shift, finally slipped through. Her antennae were slicked back against her head and, even though her posture was as straight and proud as it ever was, Naminé could practically sense the exhaustion that radiated from her as the portal dissipated back into her familiar, colorless walls and as the Nymph moved back to her place by the window.

"Did you have a good birthday?"

Larxene's voice was tired, but it was quietly knowing, perpetually amused and, even though Naminé had honestly already figured that the portals were from XII, her face broke into a wide smile and, before the Nymph even knew what hit her, two thin, pallid arms were wrapped around her lower torso in silent appreciation.

For once, Larxene was glad that the Witch wasn't tall enough to see the reluctant curling of her lips as her gloved fingers slowly brushed through that familiar flaxen hair.


End file.
